Introduction
Every damage claim is sorted and checked against three lists your company keeps itself. Damage categories are the main kind of damage, such as "Bodywork". Damage subcategories split each category further, such as "Dent". Document categories are the papers a claim should have, such as "Repair quote". They live on three screens headed Damage Categories, Damage subcategories and Document categories. Each one is a single table with a filter box above each column, a button to add a new line, and a pencil icon and a bin icon at the end of every row.
The app calls a claim a CoC — "change of condition": the vehicle came back in a different state than it went out.
You come here when:
- You are starting to handle claims in the app and the category dropdowns on a claim are empty.
- Your insurer asks for a document you do not collect yet, and you want every claim to ask for it.
- A category is used so often that you want to split it — "Glass" into "Windscreen" and "Side window".
- You are just checking what the lists hold.
Terms used on these screens
| The screen says | It means |
|---|---|
| CoC | A damage claim ("change of condition") |
| Checkout / pickup | Belonging to the moment the customer collects the vehicle |
| Checkin / dropoff | Belonging to the moment the customer returns the vehicle |
These are not the fixed categories (Dent, Scratch, Broken and so on) you pick when marking a damage during an inspection — see Record damage during an inspection. The lists on this page only appear on a claim.
How to use
Configuration
This whole page is configuration: the three lists are set up once and then used on every claim. Each company has its own lists, and they start empty — the app does not fill in any examples for you.
Before you start: the three list screens open for company administrators only. If you are not a company administrator, ask one to add the line you need. Ordinary staff still use the lists — they pick from them on each claim.
Using the claim lists
Getting there. From the main menu, open Assets and click the Damage mgt tile. (A company administrator can also get there through Admin, then Assets, then Damage mgt.) The screen headed Damage management opens with eight tiles: four for the claim worklists (New CoCs, Pending CoCs, Completed CoCs, Archived CoCs), then Damage categories, Damage subcategories, Document categories and Communicator.
Damage categories
- Click the Damage categories tile. The screen headed Damage Categories opens, with a single Category column.
- Click New category. A small window headed Edit category opens.
- Type the category in Name — for example "Bodywork" — and click Save. Cancel adds nothing.
- To rename one, click the pencil icon on its row, change Name, click Save.
Damage subcategories
Each subcategory belongs to one category. Add the categories first.
- Open the list with the Damage subcategories tile, or with the Sub categories button above the Damage Categories table. The screen is headed Damage subcategories and has two columns: Category and Sub category. The Categories button above the table takes you back the other way.
- Click New subcategory. A window headed Edit subcategory opens.
- Pick the parent in Category, type the subcategory in Name, and click Save.
| Field | Default | What it does | What it accepts |
|---|---|---|---|
| Category | Empty | Decides which category this subcategory appears under on a claim | One category from your list |
| Name | Empty | The text staff pick from on a claim | Free text, up to 200 characters |
Document categories
- Click the Document categories tile. The screen headed Document categories opens, with a Name column.
- Click New. A window headed Edit document category opens with three fields.
- Fill them in and click Save.
| Field | Default | What it does | What it accepts |
|---|---|---|---|
| Type | Other | Says where the document comes from (see below) | Checkout / pickup, Checkin / dropoff or Other |
| Name | Empty | The name of the document slot on every claim, and the file name when it is emailed | Free text, up to 200 characters |
| Required? | No | Marks the document as one a claim must have before it can move on | Yes or No |
The Type matters more than it looks:
| Type | Use it for | What happens |
|---|---|---|
| Other | Anything someone uploads by hand: repair quote, photos from the garage, police report | Every claim gets an empty slot with this name on its Documents tab, ready for a file |
| Checkout / pickup | The pickup form of the booking | Never shown on the Documents tab. When you tick it as an attachment on a claim email, the app attaches the latest pickup form it holds for that booking |
| Checkin / dropoff | The return form of the booking | The same, with the return form |
When it takes effect. Everything saves when you click Save in the small window, and new categories show up in the claim dropdowns straight away. A new document category is added to every claim, old ones included, the next time that claim is opened.
Removing a line. The bin icon at the end of a row deletes it straight away; the app does not ask you first, and there is no way to get it back other than adding it again.
Key details
What deleting does to claims already filled in.
| You delete | What happens on existing claims |
|---|---|
| A damage category | The claim's Damage category is left empty, and every subcategory under that category is deleted too — so claims lose their subcategory as well |
| A damage subcategory | The claim's Damage subcategory is left empty |
| A document category | Any file already uploaded under it stays on the claim but loses its category, and it no longer shows on the Documents tab |
To change wording, rename rather than delete: a renamed category changes on every claim that uses it. Document slots are the exception — a claim keeps the slot name it was created with.
How "Required?" is checked. When someone moves a claim from New to Pending with Save and next, or saves a claim that is already Pending, the app looks at the claim's required documents. If none of them has a file, the claim is put back to New and the message Please upload all required documents. appears. In the claim worklists, an exclamation mark shows against a claim in the same situation. The check is passed as soon as one required document has a file — so if you mark three documents as required, uploading one of them is enough to let the claim through. Check the others by eye. Damage claims covers this from the claim side.
Worked example. A rental company sets up:
- Categories Bodywork and Glass; subcategories Dent and Scratch under Bodywork, Windscreen under Glass.
- Document categories Repair quote (Other, required), Police report (Other, not required), and Pickup form (Checkout / pickup, not required).
A customer returns a van with a cracked windscreen, and a claim is opened for booking 10482. On the claim's Categorise tab, staff pick Glass; the Damage subcategory dropdown now offers only Windscreen. On the Documents tab they see two slots, Repair quote and Police report — not Pickup form. They click Save and next before the garage's €480 quote arrives: the app refuses with Please upload all required documents. Once the quote is uploaded under Repair quote, the claim moves on. When they email the insurer and tick Repair quote and Pickup form as attachments, both go with it: the uploaded quote as "Repair quote.pdf" and the booking's pickup form as "Pickup form.pdf".
What to do next: start working claims from the New CoCs tile — see Damage claims. To set up the standard emails that attach these documents, see Correspond about a claim.
Q&A
Why did the subcategories on some claims disappear? Someone deleted the category above them. Deleting a category deletes all of its subcategories with it, and every claim that used them is left with empty fields. Add the category and its subcategories again from the Damage Categories and Damage subcategories screens, then open each affected claim and pick them again on the Categorise tab.
Why can a claim never move past New, even though every document on the Documents tab has a file? A document category with type Checkout / pickup or Checkin / dropoff is marked Required?. Those slots are never shown on the Documents tab, so nobody can upload into them. If none of the visible required slots has a file either, the claim is stuck. Open the document category with the pencil icon and set Required? to No, or mark an Other document as required instead.
Why is a subcategory I added missing from the dropdown on a claim? The dropdown only shows subcategories under the category picked on that claim. Check that the right Damage category is picked first, and that the subcategory was saved with a Category — one saved without a category never appears on any claim. Fix it with the pencil icon on the Damage subcategories screen.
Why does a claim show a subcategory that does not belong to its category? Changing the Damage category on a claim does not clear the subcategory already picked. After changing the category, open Damage subcategory and pick again.
Why did an uploaded document vanish from a claim's Documents tab? Either its document category was deleted, or someone changed the Category on that document to a Checkout / pickup or Checkin / dropoff one. The tab only lists documents whose category has type Other. Ask a company administrator to add the category again, or change the document's Category back.
I emailed a claim with the pickup form ticked, but no attachment arrived. The app attaches the pickup or return form only if one was made for that booking; if none exists, that attachment is left out without a message. Check the booking's handover — see Run the pickup inspection and Take a vehicle back.
I cannot see the Damage categories tile, or it will not open. The three list screens are for company administrators only. Ask a company administrator to make the change for you.
Related pages
- Damage claims — opening a claim and working it through the worklists.
- Correspond about a claim — emailing insurers and customers, and the reusable templates behind the Communicator tile.
- Record damage during an inspection — the fixed damage categories used when marking a damage on the vehicle.